arab league observers have yet to report any atrocities after three days in the country. this is our t. coming to you live from moscow with me rena joshie tension between the u.s. and iran is mounting with tehran threatening to block a crucial oil supply route in the hormuz strait the u.s. has positioned two warships in the area where iran is carrying out a naval war games demonstration mainly to ensure a passenger remains free but as r.t. is going to count explains the situation could escalate into an all out war. responding to iran's warning the u.s. said no such disruption would be tolerated and that the u.s. fifth fleet that's based in the gulf would ensure that doesn't happen the strait of hormuz links golf and the oil producing states of bahrain kuwait qatar saudi arabia

the united arab emirates to the indian ocean about forty percent of the world's tanker shipped oil passes through that strait it's a major oil artery potential cut off might cost turmoil in the global oil market although a saudi official said that gulf nations were ready to offset any loss of. crude from the statements here you get a sense that washington things iran is bluffing because there have been there had been such threats before but right now iran's finds itself in a situation where it's a livelihood its main source of livelihood is in danger the u.s. congress passed a bill that would dramatically complicate transactions through iran's central bank european and asian nations import iranian oil and use its central bank food for their transactions president obama has yet to sign that bill that's going to be a severe blow to the reigning economy around eighty percent of its revenues depend on sales e.u.

ministers say they will make a decision on whether or not to boycott the iranian oil in coming weeks and those threats that are coming from iran indicate that it's ready to take action to protect its interests pensions rice the west says all the rana has to do is to give up their nuclear program iran says they're not doing anything wrong by pursuing a peaceful nuclear program for civilian purposes the rhetoric here in washington against iran is getting very harsh the u.s. spy drone shot down by the uranium before that a washington accusing iran of plotting to kill the saudi ambassador to the u.s. and blow up the israeli and saudi embassy in washington those were just some of the most recent episodes it all adds up and creates a lot of tension now if something happens over the strait of. this could erupt into an all out war that is there now for some of the iranian threats are warranted robert naiman from the just foreign policy think tank believes to iran is simply readying itself should the situation escalate. dinner's context for the iranian

government statements namely first of all. understood in international political discourse and international law that it was an act of war and if it is really the policy pursued by the united states and western europe to try to cut off. oil exporters then that is an act of war. who are it once you respond to that list of people you know every day you know i'm in washington every day u.s. government officials and people of influence are talking about us and it's really military strikes on iran this is have been you know context threats against iran you know threats which of course wily you know you know if you. would for bids . from attacking you know the member states without going through sufficient of the

u.n. security council and of course none of these voices are talking about getting u.n. security council approval for ducking one because they knew they could never get it . we are always easier to know your take on our stories and today we're asking why the deadlock in the strait of hormuz will lead to take a look at the site we're now about over a third of you think it'll have no serious consequences just another move and a long game while half of the viewers believe america will take advantage of the situation to strike iran the rest are split between two options whether iran will teach the west a lesson of what it's like to be deprived of vital supplies or america will back off whether sanctions have cast your vote at r.t. dot com. the debt stricken euro zone is set to enter two thousand and twelve in a gloomy mood with italy's borrowing costs remaining near the seven percent danger zone may tell you the premier is pledged more efforts to revive the ailing economy

and he's an of your speech but as our teaser in english go now reports there are huge doubts the new man in charge of a number of the eurozone states will find around ready for the struggling bloc. the autumn in europe saw the fall of several european leaders spain greece italy all of these countries are changing leadership across a two week period but who are these new faces at helm of europe's most troubled nations and will they really make things better for the people. probably not greeks pride themselves on essentially inventing democracy back in however long ago that was too bad the man who is now being touted as the man with the plan is an economist who was appointed to rule the greek people know gordon elections there well the greek prime minister was the greek finance minister at the time the greece joined the euro so he was responsible for cooking the books to get greece in for this ever expanding empire he was rewarded by going to work at the european central bank and as soon as i would mention the word referendum he was there and even if we

skirt the whole issue of current governments being appointed by someone else from another country another question pops up will they be capable of doing anything different than before well the irony is of course that many of these technocrats from. the disastrous euro project in the first place so it really is pretty annoying to then out now in charge of all these countries and that doesn't go down well with the economists who saw the eurozone disaster develop from the beginning this project is doomed to failure it was always doomed to failure and moreover i would have the rain and i would have a fistful crimes tribunals i would like to see some of these people sent to prison so far cutting the public sector firing tens of thousands of people and telling everyone to brace themselves for tough times ahead in the midst of raging protests unruly unemployment and mind blowing debt numbers these have been the only steps so far undertaken by european governments both old and new to this give us

a game of the people who think that maria monti came to help italy out of the crisis or hoping to help spain. those hearings he positions the power on was in the interest of a goal of these scientists and other major corporation this. and there is always the chance that things could get even worse there is a real possibility. in the mediterranean countries that will see governments well not even legitimate governments but will see governments overthrown i think there's also a big worry that we might well see the kind of nationalist political movement springing out of this that we thought we'd said goodbye to back in ninety forty five if the technocrats fail to reach the wreck the economy is in italy greece and spain the nations will end up not only with a bleak future between the very little reason to call themselves democratic it in the coast go r.t. . and say we're out here in our t.v.

still to come for you this hour. when these winds of police started moving me started moving forward towards me starting shooting towards our direction started tear gassing my cameraman was tear gassed i was injured that's when it really changed for me we continued to count down the top ten stories that shaved twenty one or they look back at the occupy movement across the u.s. . plus a taxi driver leaves the hollywood limelight and heads back to his russian home as it prepares for the world it was a big stage and twenty fourteen. arab league monitors are heading to three more syrian cities to witness the government's peace plan implementation earlier the visit of the city of homs saying the situation there is reassuring although clashes are said to be continuing with twenty five people reportedly killed on thursday across the country the information coming from the country's

hard to very fine as it's mostly mobile food and claims by activists clashes began in march with both government forces and protesters being armed were tons see a journalist who used to. working in the region says the difference between arab league reports and mainstream coverage shows the opposition is winning the media battle it's certainly the western media's viewpoint that we must believe the we must believe opposition groups it seems that any mobile footage is now excepted as a source certainly what the arab league said about holmes different very different a great deal from the reports we've been getting on t.v. channels of massacres continually going on what is no doubt is that thousands of syrian soldiers are dying and they did and they haven't died because of peaceful protests but this isn't a libya syria is a linchpin of the middle east and the united states and other countries some of the more intelligent people realize that there will be turmoil right across the middle

east if anything happens to destabilize the government from outside forces but certainly syria the syrian government itself has to step up the pace because it's certainly losing the propaganda battle. egyptian forces have been raiding the offices of human rights groups throughout the country reports say soldiers stopped employees leaving and interrogated them while searching their computers foreign policy analysts dr adil shamu told us it's the military government making sure it stays in power. this is part of the. supreme council of armed forces way of making sure. this. basically is molded to the to the type of government they want because that's those sort of the same generals by the way who worked for mubarak. so that's really basically is part of the struggle is that of losing going to go forward or is that . and so do you do something this is

a roll to the middle but really the military has to step aside and let the. government come to power once the election. and the elections should be held as soon as possible they will not give the order that easily but i think the egyptian people and the arabs in general have lost the fear from government and they have restored of their dignity and there were not another military dictatorship in the country i think all the evidence indicates despite the sacrifices that. they attacked us also on the table of the year and being cross talk show where people of alan his gas discuss the transcending moments of twenty eleven coming your way later today on r.t. here's a sneak peek. are we going to see the fulfillment of a lot of the hopes that you saw occur when actually fell because like i said you

can take this makes head off but what about the rest of the body will just rot at the expense of everyone else it's a lot easier to decapitate the snake than to actually kill it you know the system is in fact more entrenched and more dangerous and more vicious now than it was even under mubarak in during the time when the protests actually started the system is very good it generated itself regenerating itself and the core issues in egypt which ultimately are not just about democracy it is about bread it is about economic. it is about a growing inequality in a country that already suffered from maybe thirty to forty percent of the people living on two dollars a day or less it's about how do you reallocate resources nationally and reorient an economy to provide wealth some level of wealth an opportunity for the mass of people in that sense what's happening needs of this just a more intense version of what's happened in the united states where you have the same question. as twenty

eleven draws to it and our team is looking back at the stories that shaped the year a witness by our correspondents will look at the occupy movement in the u.s. the story covered by. i remember at the start of the so-called so-called arab spring we saw so many mass movements from europe to the middle east people rising up taking to the streets protesting and the question we kept asking ourselves over and over again is why not here why not in the united states i mean for years we've covered stories that touched upon social inequality economic inequality the overdue undue influence in fact that politics has been the money has in our financial system and i never thought that this kind of popular outrage would really come to the united states

that it would really hit home. when the occupy wall street movement began my initial impression i have to admit it was utter skepticism you know it sounded like some american protesters saw what was going on in the middle east and thought it would be i meet sort of symbolic way to emulate what they've seen for example into where square. one of the biggest things that really sort of woke me up as an individual was that that night in times square in october this was right after the supposed to be announced raid by the mayor where about three thousand if not more protesters had gathered around the park to to defend their space and they succeeded they weren't raided and we saw literally thousands of people marching into times square which you know the physical contrast of the sort of

a temple of consumerism which is times square in manhattan these flashing lights these logos these expressions of corporate power and consumer culture in stark contrast to. literally thousands of people who have gotten together to speak to shouts to feel the physical presence of of other americans who are just no longer content to sit back and watch society unfold in the direction that it's taken me. i was just feet away from the area where several police officers mountain of horseback sort of out into the crowd hurting some of the protesters seeing with my own eyes for the first time the excessive level of force. and the old gentleman who looked like he was probably in his sixty's slammed down to the ground his arms and back women of all ages men of all ages carried away for doing what for sitting down on the ground and not moving or making

a point quietly. standing there with my camera man with this line of police officers several hundred of them armed to the teeth you know what pins out sticks out a line of protesters behind me you know i thought i was there as this protected almost impartial observer there to tell the story but when these lines of police started moving at me started moving forward towards me starting shooting towards our direction started tear gassing my cameramen was tear gassed i was injured and that's when it really changed for me there are at least a hundred in the not two hundred three hundred police officers in full riot gear as you can see advancing behind us right now on the occupy oakland movement now one of the other interesting experiences i think for me was sort of seeing the contrast between occupy wall street in new york and in oakland in oakland where there is such a radical history of activism where are the people there the protesters there were

so much more outrage so much more ready for a radical fundamental change of this within this country. but at the same time. one of the experiences that really stands out to be in my mind was the day of the port shutdown on the member second you know there are thousands thousands or tens of thousands of people who were gathered who were marching around hines at the tivoli is not a lot of police presence there really felt that perhaps we had turned a new chapter in this country perhaps this was going to be an opportunity for these kinds of expressions of political discontent with the sort of crackdown that we've that we've seen in the past and what happened that evening really really shook me to the core i have to say the contrast between these peaceful marches and. seeing firsthand the streets of oakland turned into something i might have seen on the news and as you can see there are marching behind as fix their hands baton hand

i don't know if you can get any closer on that. i think that really galvanized this country and really woke us up to a reality the reality is that there is a lot wrong and there's a lot that needs to be changed but instead of sitting here and inviting experts to go and talk about it we're seeing people physically participating in what democracy really should be all about. i'm an american citizen i feel that i am here to tell the stories and i have a right to tell the stories and that is part of what this country is fundamentally founded on and sort of experiencing firsthand the the loss of the the inability to do anything the feeling of powerlessness and smallness. that's something that i think i'm not going to forget for quite a long time. well that's the final of our special

reports on a personal reflections from our team of international correspondents on the events that dominated twenty one and if you've missed any of them you can watch them any time on our t.v. dot com. and remember to join us tomorrow will be bringing you our new year special coverage here on r.t. .

now is take a look at some of the stories from around the world a fresh israeli air strike on friday morning has left one palestinian dead and another injured in gaza earlier the israeli military confirmed is preparing for a possible large scale attack tension on the border has been rising with at least four palestinians killed and several others injured since monday this week also marked three years since the start of a major israeli offensive on gaza in which around fourteen hundred palestinians were killed. clashes have erupted between hundreds of stone throwing protesters and police in the turkish city of a stamboul and the country's mainly kurdish saudis follows a deadly airstrike launched by turkish warplanes against suspect the kurdish militants on the border with iraq however local officials said the attack killed thirty five small words who were mistaken for insurgents holed marks one of the largest one day civilian death tolls during turkey's twenty seven year drive against the guerrillas. swapping tinsel town for

a russian city with an olympic crown an american taxi and a median texas driver has turned his back on the bright lights of hollywood to share in the limelight of salt the fania for the next winter olympics artie's dennis watsky copyright. you know this life los angeles is very good one of them speaks russian english and there me me i'm a man of the world he came back to sochi after a decade in los angeles where he learned that his hometown was being propelled into the world stage still. about when the boys said virgin they'll be a winter games in sochi i didn't believe them i said it is in the very south on the black sea coast but then i found out that it's true and hopefully it's going to happen as planned. the massive olympic construction effort here track to forty two thousand skilled workers from all over the world poor times the construction staff of the two thousand and twelve london games as well as those there are also people

like what i've done taking support jobs working restaurants taxi firm some stores he says being you cabdriver in sochi is nothing like his home improvement job back in los angeles. traffic like the traffic here is too much for a city of this size too many cars there's traffic in downtown los angeles but it dissolves much quicker. even so what i've done hopes the new routes and bridges being built for the olympics will help solve the problem although much of his family are with him and so she would have done misses the relative celeb behind in a way as well as the tinseltown magic where he occasionally brushed shoulders with the stars pat and yes and they are so full of the. fun. thank you. thank so much for your job. i thank you so she may have no hollywood walk of fame but our guide says there are some movie

related landmarks that than it has done if you look at people call that building the titanic and officially of course it does look a lot like that big ship and since it's built on top of the hill it has to be. really tough and pretty to greasy views from them. bringing countries together is what the olympics are about and what a dance homecoming shows how families spread from the hollywood hills to the mountain slopes of the southern russia can because despite being a world apart. our team sochi for the time now for business some day well you know you stay with us. how long the very warm welcome to the program twenty eleven has been a testing here for investors as the world economy struggles across the stock markets here and russia also suffers yet some sectors spectacularly bucked the trend to tell bushel looks at their rollercoaster ride of the last twelve months

and what to expect in the new year. gold has been an exceptional investment reached all time highs of over nineteen hundred dollars per ounce in september of two months six hundred percent in the cage but since then the price has slipped burke and brokers know more going to put a fall further in twenty twelve for the bubble will burst. the juror removed risks switching your roubles into the greenback would have brought a small return but changing into the euro would have been lost is the point that the employment both in the states and the european union mean those currencies continue to be unstable. going to become much more reliable the credit crunch what riskier lenders while the states brought in guarantees insuring all deposits up to seven hundred thousand rubles some banks now offer healthy return of

over fourteen percent a year. most weeks merger of russia's stock exchanges is a poor twenty eleven the more six slipped eighteen percent as political uncertainty worried investors but i'm missin viscously expect a strong rebound in twenty twelve as the new government settles predicting a return to previous years when russian markets where the world's best performing. but now look at the markets now let's start with oil prices are slightly lower they're still very high and that's on stronger jobs and housing data from the you asked how are the gains are limited by reports show. being an unexpected a person you ask inventories brant does not trade in at one hundred seven dollars per barrel lights which is hovering at ninety nine dollars per barrel. and european stocks are climbing in early trading as german finance minister ruled out to euro area break up the footsies given point two percent while the point three percent.

asia here shares the rise spaulding's gains on wall street weighing on the sentiment in hong kong is the latest h.s.b.c. said is saying chinese manufacturing has cooled further still some property and banks are rising. exporters are leading the gates. and finally in russia the markets are extending again straight as though on likely to make any big moves so far ahead of the new year holidays let's have a look at some of the individual share moves in the minds that's energy majors this hour supported by stronger crude gas monopoly gazprom is getting hundred percent while oil company look is a quarter of a percent in the black and financials are also high with p.t.p. bank point four percent in the black. so russia has enjoyed a persistently strong oil price this year it's been good for the budget but it's done little to propel domestic equities chaim well this means that some catching up

to do. critics plates. for russian equities which have traded lower by twenty percent in two thousand and eleven from two thousand and ten they have a lot of way to go to catch up with where the oil price adjusts they should be given the fact that the prices are relatively high russian sovereign risks are very low or yields on russian government debt of contracts are actually in two thousand and eleven so again there's more catch up that's the risk is that the government doesn't do anything and doesn't listen to the issues that have been raised because of these protests following parliamentary elections if they don't do anything materially soon after the presidential election i think for investors are going to lose faith that there is a reform agenda they want to see very material changes being made that europe today i'll get back about fifteen minutes with another update here on r.t. .

one stream cascading from my. view is mesmerizing. but this beauty brings death at a speed of more than one hundred kilometers long. step in the long run on. if you. are going to take three

months for charges free. range month free. three stooges free. food free brochures clothing videos for your media projects a free video dog r t v dot com. welcome back here with our team here is a look at the top stories the u.s. moves to warships near the area were honest carry out naval war games that's history ron threatens to block a key maritime supply route. after the outgoing year took its toll on a number of eurozone governments many doubt the so-called euro kratz now in charge will bring relieve some of them were behind the euro's failings. policy an opposition is bursting with amateur food a show.